Why Is Tinnitus Not More Common? Loud Bars, Concerts, Restaurants...

@Juan

Yes totally agree there is no escaping Loud sound. Hate it when I go jogging and hear motorbikes and some diesel vehicles that wizzes past me.

 

Makes me sad you are thinking of moving Not sure it will help a great deal unless the noise is constantly over 80 decibels. Some modifications in your life style are required perhaps using other means of transport. London Underground here is so loud and glad I only use it once a year. I do think your tinnitus will improve in time as it still early days for you and that you are sensible and aware of taking precautions where necessary. A lot of young people still carry on until it’s too late simply they are not aware of Tinnitus etc.

 

@Yuuls

Yes nerves can heal, if you follow people on these forums who had a clear case of noise trauma, pretty much everyone said that hyperacusis did improve a lot or even go away after 2+ years, so surely something must have healed, albeit very slowly.

I did a lot of light therapy, aka LLLT or photobiomodulation which has a proven scientific track report of healing nerves in various other issues.
Did it heal better or just faster, no one will know but it does not hurt, has no side effects and is a very low cost therapy - if you use the new powerful LED not the older lasers.

 

I think tinnitus IS more common. Some people either have it mildly or they are good at ignoring it. I think more people have tinnitus than we actually suspect.

 

Today there was an article on the incredible amount of noise in India and it specifically stated that there is an epidemic of hearing problems there, deafness, tinnitus etc...

 

This. I've seen 15 or so health practitioners ever since getting tinnitus and every. single. one. of them says they too have tinnitus, but it doesn't bother them.

 

Are konftec's lasers considered new powerful LED or older lasers?

 

Mild tinnitus... versus severe, big difference. Doctors see a wide variety of human imperfections and Docs tend to be very practical people. So their mild tinnitus is just something that they endure and it can be masked, but they can say they are “in the club.” I also believe many people mention they have tinnitus to simply to sound empathetic... they lie.

Some people have tinnitus on top of... diabetes, floaters, arthritis, IBS, fibromyalgia, cancer, etc... a range of human conditions.

This is a tinnitus forum, so you have many new people come here that are younger, and this is the first physical frailty they may have ever experienced. Then you have the severe cases...

 

old lasers..and weak and expensive
I looked on eBay and got a 20W LED in the 900nm range and the power supply, heat sink etc...
It's not a package, it needs to be put together but some have done it here and posted pics.

The whole set will cost under 100 USD and deliver approx 2000 milliwatts (mW) of optical power which is a lot more than the typical 50 mW of these expensive, weak lasers devices.
Optical power is about 1/10 of the electrical power for LED.
More power means deeper penetration.

 

Oof, this hit hard. I'm in the same position as you. I got my tinnitus one week after I saw my favorite band perform live, and I think that show really did me in. I live in a major US city too and the noise from traffic and transportation makes me sick. I was so excited to move here, but now I just feel empty and broken.

People always say "wow, you're so lucky to live there! you must go to so many concerts and events!" Then I have to look like a loser and say that I never actually go out because I don't want to worsen my tinnitus. And then I get extra depressed because I think of all the ways in which tinnitus has ruined my life. Fun stuff.

 

Ugh honestly I feel this so much. I am so sorry you’re experiencing the same thing.
I’m trying to find ways to turn my life around a bit and find things I like to do that are quiet but it’s so hard.

My life used to be sports events, concerts, bars, trips that involve going out with the girls (restaurants/clubs). I was never big on nature/camping/sitting at home reading and stuff like that. I’m really struggling on finding ways to entertain myself since I can’t join my friends in any of the things they do.

I’m still gonna get custom ear plugs as most foam ones are all insanely big on me (but I have tiny ears) so I can at least enjoy moderately loud places like bars and restaurants and not be totally isolated.

Or try to at least stick to outdoor things like wineries, breweries with patios, etc (weather permitting - our climate is mild but it’s usually foggy/chilly here until about a few good weeks of weather in September/October ) but I just hate feeling restricted I guess this is life now.

Even if my tinnitus does go down to a tolerable level, I will forever be afraid.

 

I hope you get custom plugs soon. They made my life so much easier as I wasn't trying to cram foam ones into my pin-sized ear canals [which never really works out for me lol].

But yeah. I'm sorry you can relate. I was never a big party person, so when I went out with my friends, it felt really special and exciting to me. Now, I just feel even more isolated and alone. It makes socializing even harder for me, and I wonder how I'm going to live my life and make new friends with this.

My T is at a tolerable level for now. I'm thankful for that, and I know I'm extremely lucky, but I know it's going to become absolutely maddening if I continue to pursue my passions in life. I'll probably need hearing aids by the time I'm 30. And, like you said, even if it were to go away, I still wouldn't risk wearing headphones or going to concerts again because I dont want it to come back. And I think that's the hardest part--by virtue of having tinnitus for several months, my life has changed for the worst. I will never go to a concert again for fun. I will never have that simple joy of listening to music on the train and watching the world go by. I will never be able to DJ again. The noise itself isnt the worst part [for me at least], it's everything the noise prevents me from doing.

 

I also wonder about this considering how noisy the world is not to mention all the people who use airpods/earbuds. I think that unfortunately some of us are just more prone to hearing damage than others. I have a friend who has had tinnitus since he was 8 due to firing a cap gun next to his year yet he constantly uses headphones, goes out to clubs and DJs with no issues. (he's 23). I first acquired tinnitus about 8 years ago and didn't know anything about protection etc so I just carried on as usual and was totally ignorant. It wasn't until about 3-4 years ago that my ears became problematic with the addition of hyperacusis. Admittedly, both my T and H are mild; I would say my H is definitely more burdensome than the T, however, and it's made me quite paranoid about loud environments.

 

The answer is hearing loss by itself doesn’t cause tinnitus... it’s something else.

If hearing loss caused tinnitus, everyone would have it.

 

For some reason, a large majority of people with hearing damage don't develop tinnitus.

 

i was just watching some footage of live rap/rock shows on YouTube... the level in these shows is obscene... these artists laying on speakers... tons of kids in the front row... to the viewers it's one night but the artists do it day in day out... and still they don't get tinnitus or talk about it... amazes me.

 

Could you please share a link to the article? The same applies to many places I'm sure. I've never been to China but I expect with all the people there is pretty noisy too.

 

It wasnt very technical. It is just a newspaper article in Spanish I read on India and Bangladesh. There was an ENT saying that hearing problems are an epidemic there, and equivalent to air pollution, actually hearing problems in the ENTs opinion are more invisible than air pollution, that can be quite evident in the most densely populated cities.

 

Honestly, for those who are ruing their lack of a social life due to tinnitus, if you had your hearing restored to its pristine state, would you start going again to loud places like bars, concerts, sporting events and restaurants? Especially with what you know now about how damaging noise can be? I wouldn't!

For me it's both awareness AND tinnitus that prevent me from going out.

 

Also it is proven that not everyone gets it, a lot of the portion of people with hearing loss never actually get tinnitus,so it's really not a common problem even though the situations that can cause tinnitus are quite common nowadays, some people are just luckier than others... And also it does not help that its severity can vary a lot...

 

My tinnitus was severe but I would say it is mild to moderate now. However I have several tones - low pitched moderately loud rumble, a quiet tonal sound in one ear (both of which are constant), and a high sound which varies between static reactive hissing mostly in the right ear, and a moderately loud ringing that fills the head. I don't know if it is better or worse to have this variety rather than a single constant sound, and some of my sounds bother me more at times than others. I can usually find ways to ignore each of them enough on any day to cope though.

 

Eh I’d still go, I’d just wear earplugs when it was loud and be more proactive about it. Sadly I was doing that for a few years before I got chronic tinnitus, I just had a few incidents where I forgot them and also years before that where I never used them. And then medication is what truly screwed me over.

I am certainly telling lots of friends who don’t yet have issues about hearing protection though.

 

The point is that despite all this abuse... those people still don't get tinnitus... like why us.

 

Maybe they have it and just don't realize it. I had never heard of tinnitus until I did an internet search on my symptoms!

 

Some people heavily smoke cigs their whole lives and never get lung cancer

 

Good question. I think that we are predisposed, sadly. Maybe we have weak ears or some kind of brain problem. None of my friend have this loud ringing. In fact, they don´t have it even in a mild form, and they go to pubs, nightclubs and concerts every weekend. They are 35 years old, and live that way since teenage days.

 

I can't speak for anyone else, but I'm thinking it's proximity. My acoustic trauma was being within 10 inches of a power saw and other power tools that could be heard a mile away. So even though a concert is loud, normally people do not have their ears within 10 inches of the source of the sound. Also, as others point out, some people might be better able to overcome it either through better healing or their minds accepting the hearing loss.

 

That's an interesting perspective and one that I think deserves further exploration. I wonder if there's also some psychological components that feed into this predisposition - I was already neurotic, anxious, and highly-strung before tinnitus which hasn't helped. I also wonder why some people can get tinnitus and then experience no worsening whatsoever even though they continue to abuse their ears. Also considering how common tinnitus is, it's likely that most people with it (which is probably fairly mild) carry on as normal and don't go to the lengths of over-protecting etc. Sadly, I think there's just not enough awareness and minimal education about the dangers of loud noise exposure and noise pollution.

There's little understanding of hearing loss/damage and the fact that it's not just a case of sounds being quieter. And hearing aids aren't a quick fix, either - not by a long shot. They don't normalise hearing. I had barely even heard of tinnitus let alone its malevolent cousin hyperacusis before onset.

 

Well... It´s just an anecdote, but one of my sisters have moderate (not so bad) tinnitus and she is an introvert girl. My other sister loves social life and went to a lot of nightclubs and shows... no tinnitus.

Many months ago I read about a link between tinnitus and type D personality.

 

I just looked up type D personality...fits me perfectly lmao. Yeah, it's interesting a friend of mine has had T since he was 8 from a noise trauma (cap gun fired next to his ear) and regularly uses headphones, goes to nightclubs, festivals, and DJs with no problems. He's one of the most chilled people I know (although I managed to successfully nag him into using earplugs for clubbing haha). It's just anecdotal ofc but it definitely makes you wonder...perhaps with a more anxious disposition our nervous systems are somehow more vulnerable and therefore prone to damage, who knows. I don't have a scientific background though so can only speculate.